Download A Lost Period of Applied Anthropology

A Lost Period of Applied Anthropology
[originally published in American Anthropologist, 64:593-600, 1962]
CONRAD C. REINING
The Library of Congress
RESEARCH into the history of applied
anthropology in the British Empire shows that
references to the practical values of anthropology
go back to the very beginnings of anthropology
and ethnology as recognized fields of study. That
the early British anthropological societies were
not strictly academic is not so surprising if we
realize that they had their origins in the active
humanitarian movements of the time, especially
the anti-slavery activities.
After securing the abolition of the slave
trade in 1807 and the Emancipation Act of 1833,
abolitionists turned their attention to questions
affecting, the general welfare of the native
peoples of the colonial dependencies (Hailey
1944:5). In 1838 an Aborigines Protection
Society was established in London. It was said
of the founder, Dr. Thomas Hodgkin, that he
wanted first of all to study the native peoples and
to help them only after he had learned how they
lived and what they wanted. Early in its history
a serious division of opinion developed within
the society about the proper methods for
protection of aborigines. The faction associated
with missionaries wanted to protect the rights of
the aborigines by bestowing on them
immediately the "privileges" of European
civilization, while the more academic faction
wanted to study the native races in order to
understand them in the process of raising and
protecting them.
The latter group left the
organization and formed the Ethnological
Society of London in 1843 (Keith 1917:14).
In the journal of this society in 1856
appeared a claim to the practical importance of
the new subject:
negrophile organization with a thin veneer of
scientific pretension. A popular journal of the
day attacked ethnology for being an inexact and
tentative science with little practical value or
popular interest. The Ethnological Society was
accused of talking for talking's sake and of
unduly extending its scope in order to include
everything comprehensible (Pall Mall Gazette,
Jan. 17, 1866).
By 1863 the Ethnological Society was split
over the slavery question and over the question
of whether man is of one or more than one
species. The divergent faction took the name of
the Anthropological Society of London. The two
organizations ran in competition for about eight
years, each marshalling "scientific" evidence to
support its claims as to the equality or inequality
of man.
Practical use was made of
anthropological
arguments
to
support
philanthropy or to attack vested interests (Myres
1944:3).
The new society was highly successful from
the view of membership. In 1867 it had the
impressive total of 706 members, in contrast
with the Ethnological Society whose greatest
membership was 107 in 1846 (Cunningham
1908: 10--11). This success was the result of
popularization of the subject and of frequent
discussion in the society's meetings of such
topics as religion, politics, and the position of the
Negro. Dr. James Hunt, the leading light in the
new organization, offered evidence that the
Negro was of a different species from the
European and, furthermore, that the Negro
differed mentally and morally even more than
physically from the European. He considered
the Negro to be a man, however, and felt that he
should be treated as such (Hunt 1863:3). The
attitude held by Dr. Hunt and his followers that
Negroes could not be expected to assimilate
civilized ways did not prevent them from writing
of the "horrors of the slaughter" of the aborigines
of Queensland and Tasmania going on at that
time (Popular Magazine of Anthropology, 1866:
6), apparently without realization that their
argument about the inequality of races was
similar to the justifications used by the white
settlers for the "dispersion" of the aborigines.
Ethnology is now generally recognized as having the
strongest claims in our attention, not merely as it tends
to gratify the curiosity of those who love to look into
Nature's works, but also as being of great practical
importance, especially in this country, whose numerous
colonies and extensive commerce bring it into contact
with so many varieties of the human species differing in
their physical and moral qualities both from each other
and from ourselves (Brodie 1856:294-95}.
The new society was not, however, received
quite so categorically by the public. It seems to
have been regarded as a rather sentimental
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character, and pave the way to a better future state
(1866: 97).
The interest shown in race matters by the
members of the Anthropological Society of
London was only part of the considerable
discussion they carried on about the. practical
applications of anthropology, for this was a
period of intense interest in such applications.
The leaders of the Anthropological Society were
concerned that anthropology not be regarded as
purely speculative and abstract, and editorially
stated that anthropology was "more intimately
related than any other branch of science to the
sympathies of humanity, and ... the utilities and
requirements of society" (Anthropological
Review, 1866: 113).
In 1866 this society
published a Popular Magazine of Anthropology
containing numerous articles on the value of
applied anthropology. The claims ranged from
modest speculations to lurid, sweeping
statements. On the more modest side were
passages such as this:
Antagonism to the ethnologists, however,
brought forth the most far-reaching of the claims
for practical anthropology:
Does ethnology take any heed of the social condition of
man? Does ethnology presume to search into causes of
epidemics among civilized man? Does the ethnologist
consider how to apply the series of facts obtained for
the bettering of the domestic condition of the poorer
classes of thc community – to trace the hidden causes of
mental aberration with a view to practical measures for
the prevention of lunacy – to investigate race and the
affinities of races, so that results may become valuable
to social reformers and statesman? I believe almost
everyone will agree with me when I say, no! Yet all
these things are but a portion, and a comparatively
small portion, of the duties of anthropologists
(MacKenzie 1866: 67-68).
Dr. Hunt claimed that "there is no science
that is destined to confer more practical good on
humanity at large than the one which specially
investigates the laws regulating our physical
nature." He urged that anthropologists should
not be "dreaming theorists, but ... every truth
discovered must be for the benefit of humanity at
large."
He seemed confident that the
government must give the same aid to
anthropologists that it gave to geologists, since it
was not reasonable to care more for the extinct
than for the living forms of life. He also
considered it to be the duty of the universities to
make the science of mankind a special study; he
looked forward to the day when all universities
would have professors whose sole study would
be the philosophy of mankind. While state aid
was certain to come, in his opinion, he felt it
wise to appeal to private enterprise to assist in
carrying out this national work, and considered
the establishment of a good and reliable museum
to be one of the best ways of arousing interest in
anthropology (Hunt 1863:2-12).
These early anthropologists were filled with
confidence in their new science and felt it had
limitless potentiality for the betterment of man.
They also considered themselves to be able to
view man dispassionately on a scientific basis as
contrasted with the previous "metaphysical"
view. They would admit no subject to be out of
bounds to them, making a particular point that no
philosophy or religion was exempt from their
inquiries (Anthropological Revue 1866: 289). At
the same time, they were aware of resentment
towards anthropology which they attributed
mainly to two influential groups which, although
they differed widely on many points, agreed in
Anthropology, independently of its scientific interest and
importance, may and should become an applied science,
aiding in the solution of the painful problems which
human society and modem civilization proffer, and
tending to the bettering of the conditions of man in the
aggregate all over the world.
Or, in speaking of the Queensland aborigine
hunts:
Anthropological science, like all sciences, is passionless
on the point, but a better knowledge of its deductions
and principles would have instilled some feeling of
prudence and pity into the murderers, who seem to
revel in the unnatural process of extinction P
( opular
Magazine of Anthropology, 1866: 6).
This magazine was an experiment in the
popularization of the anthropological attitudes
and knowledge of the day. It was published as a
result of the belief that the diffusion of literature
on the subject was calculated to benefit all
classes of society and all races of man, and that a
more general study of anthropological material
would aid in the emancipation of the human
mind from preconceived notions. There was an
especial claim for anthropology to have the
power of assisting all races of man to material
prosperity and happiness (1866: 1-2), The more
extreme hopes are illustrated in this passage:
Physical anthropology, when applied to practical
purposes, must come to every home; the enthusiasm of
youth, the fitful despair of advanced age, and the steady
glow of a hopeful intellect, steeled for youth to a
patience of "the strings and arrows of outrageous
fortune" – All these may be diagnosed and classified by
the practical anthropologist with great advantage. His
diagnosis will thus contribute to a knowledge of race-
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denouncing anthropologists. In fact, much of the
opposition to the Anthropological Society was
based upon the views of its members on the
inequality of races. The first of these opponents
was the evangelical religious body which
proceeded on the beliefs in the garden of Eden
and the flood and that God made all the nations
of the earth of one blood. The second group was
composed of the political liberals who objected
to the notion of inequality of men on the basis of
social justice (Anthropological Revue 1866:11314).
On the continent of Europe there was a
reaction against the popular anthropology of the
mid-19th century. In 1839 William Edwards had
difficulties in forming an organization in Paris
similar to the Aborigine Protection Society,
because of a ruling against societies having for
their object the discussion of social or political
questions, even though a Société des Amis des
Noirs which had had the purpose of working for
the abolition of slavery had been formed in 1788
(Buxton 1929: 781).
The difficulty was
surmounted by the adoption of a scientificsounding title for the new organization – the
Ethnological Society of Paris (Hunt 1865:xcvixcvii). A police agent attended its meetings,
however, to see that it kept within orthodox
limits. The Madrid Anthropological Society was
suppressed after a short life (Cunningham 1908:
11).
The membership of the Anthropological
Society of London fell off after its initial flush,
and after severe financial difficulty and the death
of its sponsor, Dr. Hunt, it combined again with
the Ethnological Society in 1871. The two
societies had been battling for a number of years
about the proper name for the new discipline.
Apparently there was quite a deadlock on this
matter in the negotiations for amalgamation, for
the firm action of Professor Thomas Henry
Huxley was necessary to bring about agreement
on the use of the name anthropological for the
reconstituted
organization
(Cunningham
1908:12).
Although the new Anthropological Institute
of Great Britain and Ireland took its name from
the old Anthropological Society of London, it
took none of the policy. There was a clear
change in the interests of British anthropology
after the amalgamation of the two factions in
1871.
The new organization tended to
consolidate its position by quietly gathering
information on its area of interest and to expend
its efforts in becoming a respectable institution.
Not a word about policy appears in its journal,
which implies that the society was trying to live
down the violent period of the 1860's. However,
there was not complete agreement within the
organization and some of the former members of
the defunct Anthropological Society of London
seceded, in the early days of the new Institute, in
order to found still another organization: the
London Anthropological Society. This society
published one volume of memoirs, for 1873-75,
in which its president stated that the society had
been formed for the study of the science of
anthropology in all its branches. He suggested
some topics to show the range of interest of the
new organization: the causes of the variation in
form of the human skull; the extent of
prognathism and microcephalism in Europe;
her[e]ditary deformities; the difference of the
blood corpuscles in various races; human
parasites; acclimatization of man; race
antagonism; Phoenician colonies; migration and
its influence over race characters; the diseases,
vices, and crimes of civilization; the doctrines of
Malthus and the remedies for poverty; and
causes of longevity; Darwinism; music as a race
test and the influence of music upon mankind;
the effect of diet on the races of man; the
physical effects of the adulteration of food and
impure air; the effects of premature and overeducation; the origin and value of modern
spiritualism; the physical effects of superstition;
and the origin of human speech (Braunholtz
1943:3; quoted from Anthropologia, 1873-75:3).
The organization was short-lived and the
Anthropological Institute went on with no further
radical offshoots. Professor T. H. Huxley has
been credited with the establishment of sound
guiding principles in the various branches of
anthropology; he helped to repress certain
elements, such as the persons who, taking
advantage of the glamour of the Darwinian
theory, talked nonsense in the name of
anthropological theory, and he exposed others
who saw in the structure of the brain and other
parts of the body an impassable gulf between
man and the monkey. His steadying influence
upon British anthropology was important during
this period and his conservative attitude toward
anthropology and its applications, as illustrated
by this quotation, sounded a new note that was to
become the trend in the future:
Mankind will have one more admonition that the people
perish for lack of knowledge. The alleviation of the
miseries and the promotion of the welfare of men must
be sought by those who will not lose their pains in that
diligent, patient, loving study of all the multitudinous
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aspects of Nature, the results or which constitute exact
knowledge or science (Smith, G. E. 1935:200,204).
characteristics of native races and their relations
to each other has a more practical object than the
mere satisfaction of scientific curiosity, that such
knowledge is vital to good administration, and
may be the basis for the happiness and prosperity
of millions of subject peoples (Flower
1884:493).
Even such vague statements seem to have
been rather exceptional, for the general trend
from 1870 onward was for the subject of
anthropology to become more and more esoteric
and to eschew practical applications. Professor
J. G. Frazer denied that anthropology had
anything to do with the practical problems of
statesmen (Smith, E. W. 1934:xiv). He believed
his duty was to describe preliterate peoples in
order to illuminate the history and evolution of
society. He would admit anthropology to be of
practical value only in the vague sense that "it
might become a powerful instrument to expedite
progress if it lays bare certain spots in the
foundation on which modern society is built"
(Frazer 1900:xxi-xxii).
The pattern set by Frazer indicates the
divergence of academic anthropology from
practical considerations.
Not only were
anthropologists trying to live down the attempted
popularization of their subject, but the scope of
their interests within the field was such that they
did little of interest to the workaday world.
Their interest was in the past, their research was
centered on the evolution of society. The strong
influence of the biological concepts of Darwin as
to natural selection and survival of the fittest
were adopted to ways of thinking about societies
being evolved through a series of stages. This
procedure, plus the classical interests of such
scholars as Tylor, Frazer, Robertson Smith, and
MacLennan, produced numerous volumes on the
history of various customs and institutions.
Primitive communities were of interest as
parallels to hypothetical stages of evolution of
human society. Such communities were studied
not as total units, but as collections of customs
which were analyzed and compared out of their
contexts.
The resulting material was,
nonetheless, of undeniable interest and the
quality
of
the
scholarship
of
these
anthropologists furthered the acceptance of
anthropology as an academic subject.
We see now that, after the violent period of
anthropological controversy and popularization
in Great Britain, which was engendered by the
crisis in the slavery question during the 1860's,
there was a period of quiet reaction and
consolidation. The period of the 1860's cannot
For about 30 years after the establishment of
the Anthropological Institute, the practical value
of anthropology was only rarely mentioned. The
efforts of anthropologists were primarily aimed
at getting anthropology accepted by the
universities.
No one had been trained in
anthropology, for the early proponents were
usually professional men who regarded
anthropology as a hobby. In correlation with the
emphasis on physical anthropology and the
interest in the matter of the races of man, many
of the early ethnologists and anthropologists
were physicians. At least one of these, Dr. J. C.
Prichard, is said to have chosen the medical
profession mainly because it gave him
opportunities for indulging in his anthropological
tastes (Haddon 1934: 105).
The first academic recognition in Great
Britain of the new science came when E. B.
Tylor was established at Oxford in 1883.
Another sign of the acceptance of academic
anthropology came in 1884, when a separate
section for Anthropology was established in the
British Association for the Advancement of
Science (Myres 1931:205).
The interest in applied anthropology was not
completely dead, nonetheless, for an occasional
reference to it can be found. E. B.Tylor, in the
conclusion to his best known work, Primitive
Culture, stated that ethnography could be used in
two ways for the good of mankind: to impress
men's minds with a doctrine of development, in
light of past progress, and to expose the harmful
remains of old culture. In so aiding progress
and in removing hindrances, he maintained, the
science of culture is essentially a reformer's
science (Tylor 1871:410). Later he wrote, again
in the closing paragraphs of a scholarly work,
that the study of man and civilization is not only
a matter of scientific interest, but enters also into
the practical business of life, and that it may
guide us to our duty of leaving the world better
than we found it (Tylor 1881: 439-40).
Professor W. H. Flower, speaking as
President of the Anthropological Institute in
1884, alluded to the practical importance of
ethnography to those who rule other peoples. He
urged that statesmen should not look upon
human nature in the abstract, but should consider
the special moral, intellectual, and social
capabilities, wants, and aspirations of each
particular race with which they have to deal. He
pointed out that a knowledge of the special
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be said to be of any great or lasting importance
for it was forgotten in the period which followed,
and it may be called a lost period of applied
anthropology. (This impression was heightened
by the fact that E. B. Tylor's copy of the popular
magazine published by the Anthropological
Society of London, which I used in Oxford for
this study, had lost its bindings in its 85 years but
still had all pages uncut.) And when, about the
beginning of the 20th century, there again began
to be active British interest in the practical
potential of anthropology, no one seems to have
been aware of the former intensive interest. In
1903, the President of the Anthropological
Institute commented on the need for popular
education to show the public the value of
anthropology and said that anthropologists had
been so engrossed in research or in routine duties
that they had not made sufficient effort to draw
attention to matters which might appeal to the
public (Balfour 1903: 18-21).
The various applications of anthropology
have been discovered time and again; the
potentiality of anthropology for the betterment of
man in general, and native peoples in particular,
has been brought up anew from time to time.
For instance, in the proposals for the
establishment of a School of Applied
Anthropology in Great Brit[ai]n in 1921, we find
the remark that "the anthropological point of
view should permeate the whole body of the
people" and that the lack of this "was the cause
of our present troubles" (Peake 1921:174).
In 1938, Professor B. Malinowski expressed
a view on the subject which could be matched
with some of the views of the 1860's, though he
thought the idea to be a new one, the result of a
new trend :
was evolved only in recent years (Chapple and
Coon 1942:4), they appear to be unaware of the
ideas expressed in the much earlier period of
popular and applied anthropology.
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BUXTON, TRAVERS
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SMITH, E. W.
... the anthropologist with all his highly vaunted
technique of field work, his scientific acumen, and his
humanistic outlook, has so far kept aloof from the fierce
battle of opinions about the future and the welfare of
native races. In the heated arguments between those
who want to “keep the native in his place” and those
who want to “secure him a place in the sun,” the
anthropologist has so far taken no active part. Does this
mean that knowledge serves merely to blind us to the
reality of human interests and vital issues? The science
which claims to understand culture and to have the clue
to racial problems must not remain silent on the drama
of culture conflict and of racial clash.
Anthropology must become an applied science.
Every student of scientific history knows that science is
born with its applications (Malinowski 1938:x).
And when we find, for example, in the writings
of two American anthropologists in the 1940's,
the statement that "humanitarian" anthropology
5
1934
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